A great Republican President, Abraham Lincoln, once said “If you once forfeit the confidence of your fellow citizens, you can never regain their respect and esteem. It is true that you may fool all of the people some of the time; you can even fool some of the people all of the time; but you can't fool all of the people all of the time.” As a history teacher I often find truths in the words from the past. Rarely have President Lincoln’s words rung more true for one individual, one political race, than they do for Mr. Pyle, and his bid for State Senate District One.

During this campaign Mr. Pyle has consistently dodged questions from the citizens of this district. The Republican Team Debate Committee of Nemaha, Brown and Jackson counties whose purpose, it seems, is to shield Mr. Pyle from his constituents have aided Mr. Pyle in these efforts. This committee has a unique set of criteria that must be met before Mr. Pyle will even consider attending an election related event.

This shielding became more than rhetoric found on the pages of the newspaper to the senior high school students and their teachers of Jackson County as they gathered for their first ever election forum on October 11, 2012. The idea for this forum afforded the students of Jackson County a great opportunity to learn about the political process firsthand. The planning, which started in August, seemed straightforward. Invite the local candidates, have the students develop questions, and then have a few of those students ask questions of the candidates. Simple enough or so we thought. It was not long after we invited the candidates that Mr. Wright, head of the Republican Team Debate Committee, contacted the lead high school teacher to inform us of the debate criteria. We were surprised to receive the criteria. One, we had no knowledge of it and two, we assumed rather naively, that because this forum was put on by high school students it would not apply. How wrong we were.

Mr. Wright and the debate committee let us know in no uncertain terms that if each of the ten debate criteria requirements were not met Mr. Pyle would not even “Look into it.” We worked hard to restructure our forum, which ended up being more of a debate. From the beginning we knew there was no way we could succeed.

Requirement number nine of the criteria, which read: Federal races on the ballot must be included and official surrogate or representatives from the particular party are to stand in if the candidates are unavailable. However, we sent what we had with hopes that the failure to meet number nine would be overlooked. Not only was nine not overlooked, but also many of the other requirements were scrutinized including, the selection and opinions of the students, and the integrity of the teachers involved. In spite of the negativity directed at the teachers and their students, the students from the county high schools persevered.

As pathetic as all of the insinuations were they were not as upsetting to me as the plain and simple fact that Mr. Pyle was simply refusing to meet and listen to the constituents of our district. And this has been the pattern for Mr. Pyle during this campaign. From Hiawatha, to Sabetha, to Holton, to Marysville, and nearly every community in between Mr. Pyle has hidden behind his committee’s criteria. In doing so, he has failed at his number one duty as a representative of this district. He has failed to listen. When teaching students about the election process, I often compare the campaign to a job interview. I tell the students to ask the tough questions that are important to them. After all these candidates are seeking a job and you, the voter, are their boss. So if the candidate refuses, repeatedly, to show up for the interview, does that person deserve the job or your vote?

Nathan McAlister

Hoyt, Kansas

Constituent

Teacher

Voter